Marian P. Opala

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Marian P. Opala (born January 20, 1921) is a Justice of the Oklahoma Supreme Court. He was appointed to the Court's District 3 seat by Governor David L. Boren in 1978, and retained by the voters in 1980, 1982 1988, 1994, and 2000. He served as the Court's Chief Justice from 1991 to 1992. In addition to his judicial career, Opala is an adjunct professor of law at the University of Oklahoma and the University of Tulsa, specializing in British and American legal history and constitutional law.

He was born in Łódź, Poland, the son of a prominent banker. After the German invasion of Poland in 1939, Opala, then a university student, enlisted in the Polish Army, and following Poland's defeat by Nazi Germany, joined the Polish Underground. In 1944 he escaped Poland via Turkey on the orders of his superiors in order to meet with Polish troops enlisted in the British Army in North Africa to assure them that the struggle against the Nazi occupation was being waged vigorously at home with strong Allied support. After completing his mission, he parachuted back into Poland to resume his duties with the Underground.

In 1944 Opala was captured by German forces in the Warsaw Uprising and held in Flossenbürg concentration camp in Bavaria. After his liberation by the U.S. Army in 1945, he was befriended by Gene Warr, a captain from Oklahoma City. Opala confided in Warr that he could not return to Poland after the Communist takeover and would probably settle somewhere in the British Commonwealth. Warr helped him get a job as a translator for U.S. forces in Occupied Germany, and suggested he emigrate to the US, and offered to help him. Opala settled in Oklahoma City in 1947. Six years later, he became a U.S. citizen. He graduated from Oklahoma City University School of Law and later obtained a master's degree from New York University Law School.

Opala served as Administrative Director of the Oklahoma State court system from 1968 to 1977. He became a judge on what is now Oklahoma's Worker's Compensation Court in 1977 before being appointed to the state Supreme Court the following year. In 2000, Opala was inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame. Throughout his career he has been known as a strong advocate of First Amendment rights, a commitment he attributes to his experiences as a youth in Nazi-occupied Poland. A group called Freedom of Information Oklahoma presents the "Marian Opala First Amendment Award" every year to an Oklahoman who has "promoted education about or protection of the individual rights guaranteed under the First Amendment."

In January, 2005, Opala, then 83 years old and next in line once again to become Chief Justice, filed a federal lawsuit against his colleagues, alleging that they changed Oklahoma Supreme Court rules for succession to chief justice thereby arbitrarily allowing Chief Justice Joseph M. Watt to serve unprecedented consecutive terms. In July, 2006, a federal appeals court dismissed Opala's lawsuit "with prejudice". [1]

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